This proposal on war stress, family coping, social support, and family well-being requests support for a longitudinal study on the impact of war stress on family functioning. Specific aims of the study are: 1) to investigate similarities and differences in how male and female headed single-parent families and two-parent families in which either the mother or the father has been deployed, are coping with and adjusting to the sudden family separation due to military service in the Gulf war, 2) to investigate how these different types of families cope with and adjust to the family reunion upon return of the person serving in the war, 3) to determine the role that both informal and formal social support systems play in the coping and adjustment of these families, 4) to determine how the war stress might impact parenting and how the changes in parenting might effect the children, and 5) to use the accumulated information to inform public policy relating to the mobilization of parents and to translate the evidence into future prevention and intervention measures. The longitudinal study will follow 400 single- and two-parent families who have dependent children at home. During each of three periods of measurement, data will be collected on multiple indicators of family stressors, available social support systems, parenting practices, and symptoms of distress in both parents and children. The longitudinal nature of the study allows for the construction and testing of models that represent causal links between family stressors, social support, parenting, and family well-being. These models conceptualized various roles for different social support systems in moderating the stress-distress relationship. They also hypothesize direct and indirect effects of war-stress and associated stressors on children's well-being, the indirect effects coming about through stress-induced changes in parenting practices. The testing of these models constitutes an attempt to trace the direct and indirect effects of war-stress and associated stressors on family functioning and family well-being.